Worktop replacement in Belmont

Yes. Belmont is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are HA3. It is worked on our north west London run, along with the rest of Harrow. A front drive is the best thing that can happen to a fitting day, because the tail lift comes down within a few metres of the door and nothing is on a clock. A replacement is a two-way job, with old tops going out and new stone coming in, so the van needs to stay put across the whole day. A skip on the frontage takes the space the van needed. Both visits happen in your kitchen, the template and the fit, so there is nothing to visit and nothing to collect.

The drains run down the side alley to a gully and an inspection cover near the back door, and the sink waste has always gone out on that side of the house. The kitchen is normally the original back room with a later side-return or rear extension bolted on, and that helps us: most pieces can go down the side alley and in through the back door in one length, so we can avoid joins that a front-door route would force. What is behind the old splashback decides the new one. Old breasts carry a bulge low down where the original opening was closed up, and the units stand off it before the stone is measured at all. The old top has been hiding it, so the first honest look at it happens when the laminate comes off. The old carcasses are rarely level and never were.

Suction lifters need a clean dry face to hold, so in the wet the pads come off and the piece goes back to being carried on webbing by hand. With no room to turn, the old top gets cut up in the kitchen instead, which is dusty work and needs the room emptied first. Nothing new comes down a hall still full of old top. Off-street parking means the van stays put all day, so tools, packers and the offcut we would rather have than not are all within reach. We stage the strip-out so the old tops leave in one trip rather than trickling out across the afternoon. The waste leaves with us, so the van has to still be there.

Yes. On the research for this patch it is the first of the three jobs listed, ahead of worktop installation. Rear and side-return extensions are where the islands appear, and an island is the piece that decides whether one slab does the kitchen or two. The units stay and only the surface changes, so the whole job is one day rather than a kitchen refit. A void week is the entire schedule. A new extension slab is not automatically level, and that wants checking before templating rather than after the stone is cut. The carcasses have to be sound, because stone is several times the weight of what is coming off. A plumber either side of us.

A peninsula is an island with one end tied to a run, which means the join between them has to be planned rather than allowed to happen. The existing layout is being kept, so the question is whether the old carcasses will take stone in that shape without more support. The strip-out is the part worth planning. Reckon on £110 to £550 per square metre for the material supply only, with templating, fabrication and fitting itemised separately.

Two alcove pieces will not swap over however similar they look, so they are marked left and right at the bench and stay that way to the van. We would rather find it at template than on the morning, which is why the templater looks behind the units. A filler strip is evidence, not decoration. Unlock the side gate and clear the alley of bins, bikes and pots, and arrange a plumber for the sink and an electrician if the hob is hard-wired. Where two people share the decision it helps to know early which of them is settling the edge profile and which is settling the budget, because it is rarely the same person for both. A replacement keeps the units and changes the surface, which is the least disruptive way to do this in an occupied property. Sequenced around access rather than around the workshop.

Templating, fabrication and fitting are the same three lines whether the stone came from us or from you. The workmanship guarantee is the same either way. It does not extend to a material we did not supply. The junction between the original room and the extension is the point to watch, because the two floors rarely sit at the same height. Old tops out in the morning, new stone down and sealed the same afternoon. The fastest upgrade a sound kitchen has.

Which side of the bowl they go is about how you stand at the sink, and it is settled before cutting. Machining is permanent. If a later kitchen moves the sink, the grooves stay where they were cut. The alternative stands on the surface, so the choice is losing worktop permanently or only while you are draining. The original plan put a larder and a back door on the same wall, and both leave awkward stubs once the room is opened up. The units stay and only the surface changes, so the job is a day, and what makes it a difficult day is the building. The old top comes off in pieces, not whole.

Most breakages happen on the carry, which is why the route is walked and measured before anything comes off the van. The rest of the kitchen still goes in. One damaged piece does not hold up the pieces either side. Damage found on the bench never leaves the workshop, and damage on the carry is remade under the same cover. A loading bay or a red route puts a clock on the unload, so the pieces come off in the order they will be fitted rather than the order they were loaded. We plan the strip-out and the carry as one movement so the kitchen is only out of use for a single day. The route is protected once and then used four times.

Socket and switch positions have to be final before templating, because the openings are machined rather than chopped out on the wall. Stone up a wall is heavier than tile and bonded rather than hung, so the wall has to be sound. Tiling and stone can meet, but where they meet is decided before the template rather than after. A good number have a garage attached to the flank wall with a door through from the kitchen, which is both a way in and a stretch of wall the run cannot use. What catches people out is the junction between the old floor and the extension floor, which is rarely at the same level, so a run carrying across it needs the units packed before stone goes on. A new top on a settled run needs the run corrected first.